


No Escaping the Red Night

by the_rck



Series: How Many Hours in Dowry [4]
Category: Weiß Kreuz
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Enemies Working Together, Gen, Time Travel, lack of moral compass, ruthlessness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-04
Updated: 2020-03-04
Packaged: 2021-02-23 09:07:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23009059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_rck/pseuds/the_rck
Summary: The hard part comes when Ken has time to think about what might come next. A lot of the pain that made the people he relied on hasn't happened yet, but the pain is most of what made them capable.And he's here to save the world. Making things better for his friends doesn't matter next to that.
Series: How Many Hours in Dowry [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1632988
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13
Collections: Writing Rainbow Red





	No Escaping the Red Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [demitas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/demitas/gifts).



> So... This story keeps happening. Thank you for giving me an excuse to write more.

Ken stared up at the ceiling and tracked the movement of light and shadow from passing traffic. He couldn't hear anything, so the apartment's sound proofing must have been spectacular. Ken hated the silence because it meant he had no idea what was happening outside the walls. The air was clean, filtered, so that he couldn't smell the city outside. 

He knew that the dangers he was used to weren't out there. He knew it. He simply hadn't slept without hair trigger awareness of his environment in a long time. He wasn't sure he could. He wasn't sure he should.

Most of those dangers didn't even exist yet, wouldn't ever if Crawford came through with a workable plan. It was just hard to sleep when he couldn't trust that he'd wake when a threat got near.

Ken had ended up trying to sleep on Schwarz's couch. It wasn't as comfortable as a proper futon would have been, but it was a hell of a lot better than bunking with either Farfarello or Nagi. He suspected that Farfarello would be a safer roommate right now than Nagi, and that struck him as utterly wrong.

Then again, Ken only really knew the Nagi of the future, the same way he only knew the Schuldig of the future. Ken was probably going to trip over that a lot.

The Nagi who worked for Takatori Mamoru would have been safe for Ken to share a room with. Five years, ten years, it made a difference. This Nagi thought that Ken was an asshole.

Mostly because Ken had acted like one, so the reaction was fair.

Ken suspected that Nagi also didn't like seeing Crawford fall apart. Crawford being infallible had to be a foundational thing for the kid, and being fifteen was really shitty under normal circumstances. Ken thought that being fifteen and shackled to Estet had to be worse. Or maybe it wasn't because Nagi had something upon which to focus all of his rage.

"You're thinking too loud," a soft, German accented voice said. 

Ken sat bolt upright, more because he was offended than because he was startled. "I am not!" He managed to keep the words quiet enough that they shouldn't wake anyone else. "My shields are better than that."

"I can't hear what you're thinking," Schuldig said, "but I can hear that you're thinking. This whole hyper-vigilant PTSD bullshit is like needles in my sheets. I pay attention to it because people who're harmless don't feel like that."

Ken sighed and turned to look at the part of the window that was visible above the curtains. "It's not aimed at you," he said. "I never liked either of you, but you never fucked me over." Ken's hands clenched in the sheet that covered his legs. "In a way..." He shook his head. "I expected to go back, so I didn't tell them-- tell you-- that I was leaving." He thought that the team would survive just fine without him-- they had other options for frontline muscle-- but he still wished--

"You knew," Schuldig said, and Ken remembered why he'd never liked the man. "You just didn't care. Collateral damage." He sat on the other end of the couch, somehow managing not to crush Ken's feet.

"It was a mission." Ken shrugged. "I don't think until after. I never have. Thinking leads to hesitation leads to dying."

Schuldig made a thoughtful noise. "Foot soldier thinking."

"Nah," Ken said. "Special ops but never, ever the CO. I can make decisions about different ways to attack the problem. I just don't decide what the goals are." He scratched the back of his head. "This shit-- I didn't know where to start."

"The girl you mentioned--" Schuldig hesitated long enough that Ken knew he was searching for the right question. "What are you expecting there?"

Ken was a little surprised to realize that Schuldig didn't want to know. Ken pulled his knees in and clasped his hands around them. "She's sixteen, and she looks a lot like Aya's-- Abyssinian's-- sister. She's got a crush on him since we rescued her." He fixed his eyes on Schuldig's profile. "Abyssinian's sister is exactly what the Elders want for summoning their monster. Swapping Sakura for her will disrupt things. I won't argue that part. I just-- Your idea of fun is really fucking sick."

Schuldig didn't answer for several seconds. "Takatori's daughter wasn't supposed to die."

Ken hadn't heard that before. He blinked. "I'm not sure that's better." Whatever happened to Ouka had needed to enrage her father and make him lash out.

"She'd have recovered."

"Except you gave a gun to the guy with no depth perception." Ken could see unusual tension in Schuldig's shoulders.

"Yeah. Except that."

"And you enjoyed it." Ken didn't let his tone imply accusation because it was simple truth.

"Yeah. That, too."

"At least, you're not lying about it." Ken didn't say anything for several seconds. "Honesty doesn't mean no consequences." He considered warning Schuldig about Takatori Mamoru, but Ken still thought Schuldig deserved not to see that coming. There might be years of terrible things this Schuldig hadn't yet done, but there was still a lot he had done and didn't regret at all.

"So what should I do when I meet your friend?"

"I don't know," Ken replied. "Just not that."

"Would you care if I did it to someone else?"

That was a question Ken had already addressed during the years that were never going to happen. "I didn't stop Balinese when he started strangling his one night stands." Ken wondered if that mental fracture was a thing that could be-- or should be-- prevented; Yohji was kind of important, going forward.

Crawford would know.

Schuldig flinched visibly.

"It's true," Ken said. He didn't try to hide his amusement. "Things got pretty bad for all four of us. I came out the other side pretty damned comfortable with the fact that I like killing people. I'm more in it for the adrenaline, but I don't suppose the corpses give a fuck why I do it."

Schuldig turned to look at Ken. "I _know_ you. Not you-you but the other you. I know all four of you. Crawford said I needed to. You're _wrong_. I don't get how you come from him."

"Fifteen years," Ken said. Somewhere during the evening, he'd lost his pleasure in having the upper hand. He hoped he'd get it back tomorrow because it was the only thing he'd gained from giving up his world. "One hour at a time. One foot in front of the other." He hadn't had any sort of map.

Crawford had always had a map, even if it had a lot of blank spots.

Ken was so very, very jealous about that. "Be kind to Sakura," he told Schuldig. "She can hear truth. Well, not yet. She will hear truth. Crawford-- my version-- worked with her because she could tell how true-- or not-- his visions were."

"That..." Schuldig shook his head. "That sounds really fucking useful." His inhalation was audible. "Crawford missed it?"

Ken closed his eyes. "Yeah."

"I kind of think we might need her now."

"She can't do it yet."

"What changes?"

Ken couldn't answer because he was almost certain that the change was her time with Schuldig.

"That's what I thought," Schuldig said, and Ken realized that his silence was an admission. Schuldig pulled out a cigarette. "Damn. I left my lighter."

Ken didn't respond.

"Do you know her address? Which school she goes to? Some other way to find her?"

If Ken had ever known any of that, he'd forgotten it. He didn't even know how Schuldig had found her in the original timeline. "Kritiker knows. That creep who sold Masafumi all those stolen organs took one of her kidneys." His reasoning for not letting Schwarz near either Sakura or Aya-chan tonight still felt right.

But Ken had fucked up by following his instincts before. He'd also fucked up by ignoring his instincts.

"So she already knows you?"

Ken was pretty sure the question was a trap. "Yes." Then he saw a way out. "But me fifteen years younger. She'd notice the difference."

"So you could be your older brother or your uncle or something. It's still an in." Schuldig flipped the unlit cigarette back and forth between his fingers. "If you want me to be kind, I need to start sooner."

Ken recognized that for the blackmail it was. "Fuck off." He followed up with a rude gesture.

Sakura had probably gone home already. Aya wouldn't have left her sitting next to Aya-chan any longer than absolutely necessary.

"We need her to like all of us," Ken said.

"You think I can't be charming?" Schuldig sounded insulted.

Ken thought Schuldig was a garish gaijin who looked dangerous in all the wrong ways for a teenage girl. "I think Nagi would have better luck." Ken made himself consider sixteen year old Tomoe Sakura and look at the fact none of his objections to kidnapping her were moral. He sighed. "She was at the hospital with Abyssinian's sister earlier tonight. I doubt she is any longer." Assuming that Aya went straight back there after killing the Prime Minister. He might not have risked it.

"Checking would be something to do."

"You just want a project while Crawford's brain resets."

"Well, that, too." There was cheerful viciousness in Schuldig's voice. "Mostly, I want you to admit that you're going to have to fuck over people you know."

Ken wanted to put several knives into Schuldig. He could place them all so that the asshole telepath didn't die.

And, then, Farfarello and Nagi would--

Yeah, that would be why Ken had decided not to bring weapons. He'd left those with the time travel device.

"Give me five to get dressed," Ken said. Part of him hoped desperately that Sakura wouldn't still be at the hospital. The other, much colder, part of him knew that a lot of things would be easier if she was. "You better have something for knocking her out without harming her."

Sakura was still innocent enough to believe that Fujimiya Aya might send Hidaka Ken's uncle to make sure she got home safely. Even after the stolen kidney, she still trusted that the world could be kind. How much of that trust she kept was going to depend on how well Ken managed the next bits. Maybe he wouldn't fuck it up entirely.

Ken was glad he'd lost every mote of his own innocence a long time before.


End file.
